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MONUMENT TO
PEOPLE
The MONUMENT TO PEOPLE is a pyramid made of PAPER and soil,
that will be naturally
covered by the site vegetation. Its construction has already started
and will continue FOR A LONG TIME. My
idea is to drive the discussion on the need to SEQUESTRATE
CARBON as a means
to mitigate the current process of GLOBAL WARNING. Place:
the ECOLOGIC PARK HUDSON in Buenos Aires, ARGENTINA,
frequently visited
by SCHOOL PUPILS, who will be so introduced to a problem that they
will compulsorily inherit. This new TOURISTIC OBJECTIVE will
help to create
a pole of development in the middle of a long neglected
community. This
is an ART WORK that belongs to a NEW CULTURE. It will
collaborate in THE
DEVELOPMENT OF A SOCIAL ATTITUDE that is absolutely necessary
to confront
the changes, that in the coming years will be become
inevitable.
In
days to come, I intend to build a pyramid of PAPER and SOIL in
ARGENTINA,
up to where we will be capable of making it grow, as an INDICATOR
OF GLOBAL WARMING and in order to start a discussion on what we
can do to face this urgent problem. With
the cooperation of many friends, the MONUMENT TO PEOPLE came
into existence
last April 23, 2005 in ECOLOGIC HUDSON PARK, a small wild
reservation in
the Province of Buenos Aires next to the Museum, home of
Guillermo Enrique Hudson (internationally
famous writer, 1841-1922). The
HUDSON PARK is in "Los 25 Ombúes" in the district
of Florencio Varela
(www.husmeando.com.ar/hudson.htm), on the route linking BUENOS
AIRES
CITY and LA PLATA, capital of the province. AS FROM NOW ON
The
MONUMENT TO PEOPLE can help us to introduce young students
visiting the
museum the GLOBAL CLIMATIC CHANGE issue. It’s also intended
to be a TOURIST
SPOT, a progress landmark inside a forsaken community. ITS
ATTRACTION IS TO FOLLOW, monthly, ITS PROGRESS. The shape of the work will BE PYRAMID LIKE, though it will be subject to the changes resulting from the INTERACTION WITH THOSE WILLING TO PARTICIPATE. It may include human shaped sculptures, works of artists or craftspeople willing to accept the rules of the game: as the monument grows these works will remain in it till they disappear. The
MONUMENT TO PEOPLE is a WORK OF ART. It’s not a profitable
project, though
it might be. It seeks controversy on the topic of GLOBAL
WARMING and
its consequences, well-known to experts and even politicians,
though the
community as a whole is reluctant to accept it. Some
well intentioned ecologists might not like this, as this work denies
the need to recycle paper, an indisputable "truth"
to many. Our aim
is to induce RATIONAL, NON-PREJUDICED, NON-EMOTIVE thinking
options. The
dramatic present situation demands it. It
is important to deepen the discussion, to manifest the GLOBAL
WARMING drama.
We need to encourage more categorical attitudes towards FACING
THE
NON-STOPPING CONCENTRATION OF CARBON DIOXIDE IN THE
ATMOSPHERE.5 Eduardo CALVO @4450 The
excess of CARBON PRESENT IN THE BIOSPHERE IS THE CORE OF OUR PROBLEM.
It produces a progressive warming of the atmosphere with infinitely
varied and, on the whole, negative consequences. Art
cannot solve the problem. We will need new governors to do so,
but ARTISTS
SHOULD NOT BE INDIFFERENT to it. Through
the MONUMENT TO PEOPLE, I wish to remind THE NEED OF REDUCING CARBON
from the ecosystem of our planet, and to announce THE END OF
THE OIL CULTURE.
NOT
NECESSARILY NEGATIVE VISION Human
beings are modifying certain physical parameters on the
planet. There
are already 6.200 million or more of us. Nowadays, NO HUMAN ACTIVITY
AT ANY IMPORTANT SCALE IS INNOCUOUS. The
future situation should not be necessarily negative. At the
same time,
although it’s the origin of our problems, our amazing
progress allows
us to CONTROL NATURAL PROCESSES (at least in a limited way),
as long
as we act responsibly and without any prejudices. The
IRRATIONAL BURNING OF FOSSIL FUELS, as if it were innocuous,
and the building
of a whole civilization around oil, as if it were a non-finite
resource,
leads us to an ENVIRONMENTAL, ECONOMIC AND CULTURAL
CRISIS. But
the boosting of knowledge that started with the Industrial Revolution,
will make available new sustainable energy resources, that will
keep us progressing and even will allow us TO CLEAN THE
ATMOSPHERE IN THE FUTURE. The
problem is HOW TO OVERCOME THIS TRANSITION at the lowest
possible cost.
OUR OWN SURVIVAL AND IDENTITY ARE IN DANGER. We artists, must contribute
with what we can, for instance by denouncing prejudices. The
cultural INERTIA, even more than the affected economic
sectors, is DELAYING
THE NECESSARY CHANGES. At some point in the future, we will need
to arrive to a technical solution to the problem.
OUR
ENEMIES ARE IN SIGHT, AND WE DO NOTHING CARBON
DIOXIDE (CO2) and METHANE (CH4) are our most important enemies
today.
Their way of affecting us is the INCREASE OF THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT.
But there is a third one under cover: the INERTIA that leads
us to
do AS IF NOTHING WAS ABOUT TO HAPPEN. Mainly,
the rapid negative evolution of the planet’s average
temperature is
a consequence of THE GROWING CONCENTRATION OF CO2 in the
atmosphere, as
a result of the burning of fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal).
CH4, a product
of organic decomposition, and other gases also contribute to
the GREENHOUSE
EFFECT. CO2
and CH4 are both part of nature’s cycle. The problem is
that, as we extract
fossil fuels from the depths of the Earth and burn them, WE BOOST
THE VOLUME OF CARBON PRESENT IN THE ATMOSPHERE, which leads to
higher
concentrations and INCREASING THE AVERAGE TEMPERATURE. How
to EXTRACT THE CARBON FROM THE ATMOSPHERE is a technological
as well as
a political problem. Not only we do ignore how to do so
efficiently, but
also we are not aware that it needs to be done. Above
all, we do not have a powerfull enough energy to reduce an important
part of the carbon dioxide and extract the oxygen present in it.
But this is easily done by plants and trees, which use the
abundant solar
energy (PHOTOSYNTHESIS). In
order to put the necessary measures into practice, we might
need a shock
-for example an ATMOSPHERIC DISASTER. WHY BURY PAPER?
The
MONUMENT TO PEOPLE is a pyramid like artificial mountain, made
up of PLASTIC
BAGS CONTAINING WASTE PAPER AND SEMI-PERMEABLE BAGS CONTAINING
SOIL. PAPER,
which is made from wood, is mainly composed of cellulose (C6
H10O5), a macromolecular polysaccharide full of carbon. While
they grow, superior vegetables STORE IMPORTANT QUANTITIES OF CARBON
in their wood, extracted through photosynthesis of the atmospheric
CO2. PAPER can store carbon stably and lastingly, if its decay
is avoided. Growing
forests can efficiently control the rapidly increasing concentration
of CO2. But THEY DO THEIR WORK WHILE THEY GROW, AND THE FASTER
THE BETTER. FORESTS
ARE CESSPOOLS OF CARBON. Wood can have various densities but, according
to calculations, each cubic metre contains the carbon aquivalent
to one tonne of CO2 on average. When
an adult tree’s growth has decreased or stopped, the process
above mentioned
falls substantially and even reverts. THERE MUST BE YOUNG, HEALTHY
TREES IN CONSTANT GROWTH TO PROTECT THE ATMOSPHERE. Decaying forests
generate large amounts of methane (CH4) as wood rots away,
thus ruining
the fight against warming. If
we use wood to make PAPER in a suitable way, replacing felled
trees systematically
(under the economic conditions to make this profitable), we
can help solve this problem by LOCKING CARBON in its
cellulose, thus keeping
it out of the atmosphere and avoiding its rotting and return
to the
biological cycle. Economic
activity generated by new PAPER industry supports the creation
and
maintenance of young forests in rapid growth. Recycling
reduces the need
of them. This is why we propose to set an EXAMPLE by
IMMOBILIZING LARGE
QUANTITIES OF PAPER in our MONUMENT TO PEOPLE, in order to increase
the need of new tree plantations. This
clashes with our intuitive idea and the good intentions of
honest ecologists
who take PAPER recycling as universally valid. They do not bear
in mind that, under the present dramatic circumstances, IT´S
NOT ENOUGH
TO PRESERVE FORESTS. We need many more of them and in rapid growth,
so that they reduce excess CO2 through photosynthesis. Burying
paper in the MONUMENT TO PEOPLE has an added benefit. It’s
like leaving
a LEGACY TO OUR POSTERITY, clues for terrestrial or extraterrestrial
archaeologists to find, in hundreds or thousands of years,
remainings of our newspapers and try to find out what on earth
happened
to us. Nowadays, we speculate similarly about Mayan hieroglyphics;
apparently their society also collapsed following an environmental
crisis.
PROTECTING
THE FUTURE Cellulose
is stable, but not indestructible. It’s easily attacked by a
number
of insects, fungi and micro organisms which break it down, in
the long
term generating more CH4 and CO2 from their digestion
sub-products. In
order to have a long lasting carbon locking we must ISOLATE
THE PAPER for
building our MONUMENT TO PEOPLE as much as possible. The idea
is to wrap
it in the least biodegradable kind of plastic and then bury
it, so as
to postpone the release of unwanted gases, as the mountain
compacts under
its own weight. Experiments
done by archaeologists, when examining old garbage dumps, show
that by ELIMANTIG THE CONTACT OF PAPER WITH AIR it is possible
to avoid
methane emissions. In
years to come someone might incidentally, even get to read
news in our
papers when researching into "a solid structure built,
with some purpose,
by intelligent, probably human, beings".
JUST
AN EXAMPLE We
should not expect to revert the cycle so that the PAPER
accumulated in
the MONUMENT TO PEOPLE again turns into fossil fuels. The
geological process
which buried huge amounts of carbon in the form of
hydrocarbon, gas
and coal, took millions of years. But we can expect TO GAIN
TIME, TILL
THE DEVELOPMENT OF NEW, POWERFUL FORMS OF ENERGY -and a NEW CULTURE-
give mankind the opportunity to recondition the environment, now
drastically disturbed. The
process of CLIMATIC CHANGE, pushed up by burning fossil fuels
CANNOT BE
STOPPED. Its consequences are INEVITABLE; we can barely soften
its effects
and, above all GET READY TO FACE ITS CONSEQUENCES. Collecting
paper and burying it properly HELPS, BUT LITTLE. Let’s put
it this
way: ONE KILO OF PAPER CONTAINS AS MUCH CARBON AS HALF A LITRE
OF GAS
OIL, an insignificant dose to our consuming fever. Looking
around, it’s easy to notice that THERE JUST ISN’T ENOUGH
PAPER. Yet,
to COLLECT PAPER AND CAPTURE THE CARBON IN IT can prepare us
for the
future, and make us aware of what is going on around us. There
is no time to waste. It won’t be long before we can feel the
effects
of global warming. What’s more, MANY OF US WILL ACTUALLY
LIVE THE
FORETOLD CHANGES.
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